


Anchored

by Nessotherly



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Character Study, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Interplanetary Travel, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-24
Updated: 2019-01-24
Packaged: 2019-10-15 18:04:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 991
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17533571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nessotherly/pseuds/Nessotherly
Summary: Riku wants to leave - he really does, but there are somethings he cannot bring himself to leave behind.





	Anchored

**Author's Note:**

> This ficlet is written for the small prompt meme brought on the Sea Side Dreamers discord server: A New Beginning.  
> The prompt here is Fool.  
> Have a nice read!  
> (This is not beta'd, and I am no native english speaker, apologies in advance)

 

As a child, Riku had dreamed many times of packing a small knapsack and setting off into the world to new adventures. Of course, it hadn’t been that simple. For a start, he had come to realise that travelling required funds, and as an eleven years old, he didn’t have any. He managed to gather a small amount of munny for Christmas - learning, by the bye, that Santa Claus was indeed a made-up story, thus checking up on Sora in the middle of the night by the means of their talkie-walkie to disclose how untrustworthy grown ups really were — and had started planning out his journey on a torn up page of his calculus notebook. Everything had been methodically prepared (after all, he had finally mastered the complicated art of divisions and could therefore calculate _anything_ ), until he had come to the realisation that he was a minor.

Minors could not get jobs, and he would probably starve in less than a week.

Therefore, he made sure to learn how to fish, and dragged Sora along on these long afternoons by the pier trying to catch whatever fish couldn’t be scared off by Sora’s constant babbling. One day, they found Kairi. And what a _catch_ she had been. The mayor adopted her, and they had found a new mate to join them on their learning of survival skills.

His father also taught them how to cook, although their attempts were mostly disasters that ended up in food fights. And soon, Riku knew the time would come he could leave for new adventures - get on the first ferry off their tiny island to join the main land and win over every new obstacle that would come his way.

The problem was — and he realised it the first time he disclosed his dream to Sora and had him wailing for a full _hour_ \- that he could not leave on his own. No. He couldn’t just leave Sora behind.

And Sora — well, he couldn’t ever leave without Kairi. Riku knew he would have left with him in a heartbeat had him asked the younger boy to join him, but — he knew Sora would never appreciate the adventure if it meant he had to be parted from his soon to be sweetheart.

So Riku had unpacked his bags and stayed home. He’d watched the clock tick past the time of departure of the ferry, and cried himself to sleep, until he promised himself never to cry again.

And he didn’t for a long, long time.

Years passed and he ended up accepting Kairi among their previous little duo, and started to see them as a trio. He even grew a crush on her, maybe out of spite - he never really forgave Sora for keeping him stranded on the islands - and he _knew_ he could win her over him. He was older, after all; stronger, and he fished and sparred and ran better than anyone else he knew. Better than Sora.

He didn’t mind showing off - he had a point to prove.

* * *

One day, Sora shared his own longing for adventures - Riku almost tripped on his feet and did his best not to bawl at him. 

‘You, me and Kairi — we could _leave_. Think about it Riku. There’s so much more out there, so much more we haven’t _seen_.’

And of course, Sora had been young on that fated morning he had made the mistake of revealing his own plans of escape only to see them ruined by his own attachment to the kid. Sora probably didn’t remember it had been his _own_ idea _first._ But Sora had looked up at him, beaming and hopeful and so incredibly _naïve_ —

Therefore Riku had recovered his own notes and shared his forgotten plan of attack. No ferrys and trains and surviving in the wilderness this time - Sora wanted to build a _raft_.

And Riku knew it wouldn’t work. There was no way this would work, and he suspected Sora and Kairi knew too. But he would pretend, just for his friend, so he wouldn’t have to face his disappointment if he had to force him to face the truths of the world and _admit_ this was a terrible idea.

But that was okay - Riku did swim better than the rest of them. If need be, he’d rescue them. He still had a point to prove.

* * *

‘We could build a raft’ Sora said, a few years later, but his voice betrayed his own lack of enthusiasm. Not that there was any enthusiasm left for them to nurture, to be perfectly honest. This beach was as foreign as anything else they’d ever seen - it was cold and darker than any night they’d spent stargazing in their old island. Rocks faced them like hostile shadows and were scattered across the horizon. A riff of darkness no one could ever hope to cross, be it in a raft or in the fanciest yacht they could possibly imagine. They were trapped, at the edge of their journey without ever being able to set foot back to where it all started - back home. 

Riku had never thought he could one day be _homesick._

Therefore, he laughed - and laughed and laughed some more, a hysterical and sad laugh that had Sora curling up around him to try to calm him down, to tether him back down to the sand and his embrace and this very embodiment of a metaphysical anchor he had fooled himself into believing he _hated_.

Oh, no. He didn’t hate Sora. Had _never_ hated Sora. Sora was the only everything he could possibly lose himself for.

‘Let’s build a raft.’ he finally replied in between hiccups of laughters and unexpected sobbing.

But they never did - the door to light appeared before their very eyes, shining its light upon their embraced bodies and brought on by the only vessel they had ever needed to carry them home; their friend’s bottle lost at sea.


End file.
